New Albany man disagrees with GOP chairman

BY — Dave Matthews, Floyd County Republican Party Chairman, is highly critical of the proposed health care reform proposals (The Tribune, Aug. 18, 2009). Dave picks a few points in the 1,017 page bill, which he doubts that Baron Hill has read, and then levels criticisms.

First, he says Section 113 mandates a government audit of the books of all employers that self-insure. Section 113 does not mandate audits. It directs the proposed Health Choices Commissioner to conduct a study to see if goals are being met.

Next, Dave says that Section 123 states that there will be a government committee deciding what treatments and benefits you get. Right now we have insurance companies deciding what treatments and benefits you get. They do it in insurance policies that neither you, nor I, nor Baron Hill, have read. They limit coverage as they see fit, and they don’t allow some people to have a policy at all. A government program won’t be perfect, but people who have a government program called Medicare seem a lot happier with it than people seem to be with their health insurance policies.

Next, Dave says Section 163 will give the government access to your finances; a national health care ID card will be issued; and this will give the government direct access to your bank accounts for electronic funds transfer. That section doesn’t give the government access to your finances. It does provide for a national health care card. We have one now. It is called a Medicare card, and it seems pretty popular among those who have them. And how is it different from an insurance card? As for electronic funds transfer, the government already deducts Medicare premiums from Social Security checks and people seem to like the convenience. The government uses electronic funds transfer to put Social Security checks directly into checking accounts; employers do the same thing; banks take your mortgage payment out of your checking account; utility companies take out their charges; so do newspapers; and people like it so much they sign up for it.

Dave says Section 203 requires that the government mandate benefit packages for private health care plans. This is exactly what the government does with Medicare supplement plans. The consumer can choose from plans A through L, but every insurance carrier must provide the exact same coverage for each plan. It seems to work fine. And what it will do is stop allowing insurance companies to exclude coverage for preexisting conditions, stop allowing them to define coverage narrowly, stop allowing them to exclude entire groups of people; stop allowing them to make their own rules without giving us any choice.

Dave says Section 225 means that doctors will make less than auto mechanics, because the government will tell the doctor what he can earn. Once again, the insurance companies are doing that right now. Medicare also establishes doctors’ allowed fees, seemingly with greater success than the insurance companies, and with less paperwork and expense.

Dave says it all makes him think he is in Europe. That would be to his benefit. The UN says life expectancy in Switzerland, Spain, Sweden, France, Italy, Norway, Austria, Netherlands, Greece, Belgium, United Kingdom, Germany, Finland, Ireland, Luxembourg and Denmark is higher than it is in the U.S. Much maligned Canada comes in at number 11, 20 percent above the world average, while the U.S. comes in at number 38, one spot below Cuba. Just Wednesday our government reported that the U.S. lags behind 30 other countries in estimated life span; and a full five years behind Japan, 78 years compared to 83.

Science Daily reported that the United States places last among 19 countries when it comes to deaths that could have been prevented by access to timely and effective health care. Fourteen of the countries ranked higher were in Europe, plus Japan, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. If the U.S. had performed as well as the top three countries (France, Japan and Australia), an estimated 101,000 fewer deaths per year would have occurred in the U.S.

Wikipedia says universal health care has been implemented in all industrialized countries except the U.S. Yet the U.S. has 46.7 million people who are uninsured, nearly 1 out of every 6 Americans, with millions more underinsured. Isn’t that the ultimate rationing of health care?

Dave says Section 1233 mandates advance death planning, in other words, living wills and durable powers of attorney. That section doesn’t mandate planning, it allows coverage for it and encourages it. You probably need a will, but you definitely need a durable power of attorney (which directs how your affairs will be handled if you become incapacitated), and a living will would be a really good idea also. You are doing your family a disservice if you don’t plan for your death or incapacity. If you had coverage, you would be much more likely to do that planning and have those documents prepared.

What I can’t understand is why Republicans aren’t on the bandwagon. The cost of health care is crushing American business. Auto makers, for example, spend more on health care than they do on steel. Removing the burden of providing health insurance would be one of the best things that could possibly happen to businesses. I thought Republicans were supposed to be in favoring of helping businesses.

Dave closes by saying that Baron Hill realizes that supporting this legislation will probably end his career in politics. What a compliment! If Baron Hill really is willing to do the right thing even if it costs him reelection, then he is one of the few statesmen left in America. And universal health coverage clearly is the right thing. We are the richest and most powerful nation the world has ever known. How can we not provide health care to every citizen who needs it, when the rest of the developed countries of the world already have done so for their citizens?

Text Only | Photo Reprints